Sunday, December 26, 2010

Trouble at Transit: Is agency in control?

The Miami Herald reports:
In April 2009, a janitor sweeping Miami-Dade Transit's office made a startling discovery: In an empty cubicle on the 16th floor of the county's Overtown Transit Village complex, the cleaner found wads of cash totaling $9,863 and old checks for $14,772.
The former employee who had occupied the desk, Jeffrey Bechdel, helped run the county's seven-day Visitor Pass program, which sold weekly passes for bus and Metrorail. For 2 ½ years, before leaving Transit in January 2009, he stuffed the sale proceeds in his desk drawer. ``I'm a lousy bookkeeper,'' he later told police.
Police pegged possible losses at $120,000, but the staffer wasn't criminally charged. The reason: There was no evidence he stole, and investigators determined the agency was riddled with administrative flaws, including failing to create a system to deposit money from the pass sales.


High speed rail will be run better: Obama promises that with sugar on top.